Attend the Tale
by Zasiiniya
Summary: Everyone has a story to tell, and the closer you look at the details, the more the larger picture may change. Lots of spoilers, but I don't know why you'd read this if you weren't familiar with the story anyhow...
1. The Judge

It was not his fault; it was in no way his fault; the thoughts coursing through his mind blinded him, and yet, at the same time, gave him strength. It was as if something possessed him – a devil or a demon or a simpler thing, something more human perhaps. An emotion. But this was not love: this strangling infection could not be love…

And yet, laying eyes on her, it could not be anything but. To gaze at her was to inspire the sort of poetry that the greats penned. It was to conjure up all of the beauty within you. How could something as frail and lovely as her inspire any malice? How could she possess something in her like this fever possessed him now? If it was not her fault, than it must be his; but again, he felt that the contractions in his muscles, the strength within him that this love – lust – gave to him, was not his own.

She was beautiful, and there was nothing to be said to counter that. Johanna with the hair of gold, the grey-green eyes, the pale, soft flesh; she was everything that was right with the world, everything peaceful and beautiful, and like a flower, he wanted to pull her from the earth, to take her from where she belonged and hold her with him forever. And yet there was an attached emotion that came with her, too: guilt. When he looked at her, he saw in her not only Johanna, pretty, young Johanna, but also sweet, pure Lucy, Lucy who was guilty of no crime but vanity, who never hurt another living creature; and Benjamin.

It was the man he was most guilty of, the father, and it hurt sometimes to look into Johanna's eyes, because they were so like the deep eyes of her father. But he forced himself to swallow down the feelings, the self-hatred, the old half-burnt fire of regret, and to think of her not as the unity of two people who he'd wronged, but as a new beginning; she was his now, first as daughter, soon as wife. She could not be stolen away, nor given to the world.

He did not deserve her, he knew. He did not deserve to keep her there, to keep her away from humanity and its horrors, and yet something told him that she would wilt, would lose her colors, would fade and die, were she exposed to the harshness of the world. So he kept her now, and so he would keep her forever; she would be his and his alone until the end of time, if he had anything to say about it.


	2. The Sailor

Each day, as the sun rose, he wanted to sit and watch it; each night, when the sky turned indigo and the stars danced within it, he curled his arms around his legs and gazed up at the constellations, a million questions flitting through his mind. When he was young, all he wanted in life was to do these things, to be able to take his life slowly, not to spend his days cooped up in a factory or too tired from working to appreciate the beauty of the world. If this meant spending his days alone, that was fine with him. He was only glad that he had the opportunity to travel the world, to watch the sun rise over the mountains of Peru or to listen to the singing of Spanish dancers. This was his life, and he was content, happy even.

Until he saw her.

She was a painting, a lovely gorgeous artwork, the wind blowing strands of hair loose from her braid, her pale fingers twined, her eyes turned up to the sky, her voice sounding like a lark's – oh, he could live forever in that moment, that moment between nothing and everything. The moment, the sound, the image, the feeling, that changed his life, changed him more than any Peruvian sunrise ever had the power to.

Johanna, her name was, pretty little Johanna, and he bit his lip thinking that the angel had a name – proof that he did not imagine her, that he was not, in fact, dreaming. Angels could exist; now, if she'd only turn her gaze down from the sky to look upon him, his life would then perhaps be complete: if only, if only.

Within days they were together; by some chance, some lucky star, she found him just as enthralling as he found her. Perhaps it was that she hardly ever had left her tower, her confines, and he had traveled the world: she was starry-eyed when he spoke of ocean voyages, of the wonders of the far-off continents. Or perhaps it was truly a mutual infatuation; whatever it was, it was pure ecstasy, and to think they'd be married someday soon was a song that his heart could gladly sing.

He'd never fallen so quickly before, nor so hard, and had he stopped for a moment to think about what he was doing he would have been alarmed. This man, this hurried, absorbed man, this love-struck man, was hardly the person he thought he was, but it appeared he'd grown up overnight, grown into someone he didn't know he could be.

Well, whatever, and if it helped him take her, take her away from evil, then good: he would grow, he would change. And though he would never again spend his nights alone, watching sunsets or stargazing, that was fine with him: he would be with her.


	3. The Girl

**[I saw the movie this afternoon. It's awful, and beautiful, and the most disgusting movie I've ever seen. What annoys me somewhat is how they changed Johanna; thus, my choice to write her here. In the movie, it felt like they were trying to make her seem more innocent, softer, younger; I know she's 16, but in the play, it seemed like she did a lot more and had a larger part, especially involving Fogg. (By the way, the first paragraph of this refers to how Fogg said she was especially bad, since she sang all day and night. They left this out of the movie, and also they never showed her singing in the asylum.)**

The songs played about on her lips, and to be stifled in such a place an insane asylum was to feel as trapped as if she was back home, only now she did not have her pensive silences, her birds, her silks, her great views: she had only the ravings of the lunatics and the beatings of Fogg. She sang. She sang every day, since the songs would not leave her mind – songs of hope, songs of love, songs of Anthony. She suffered for it, but for all he knew he was beating just another lunatic, not what she really was.

And what _was_ she? If she had grown up in a different life, maybe she would have been more confident in herself, but now, her hands clenching the bars until her knuckles were bloodless, she could wonder. Was she, then, actually insane? To refuse the demands of the judge? It was true that he had raised her, raised her as his own – but like a daughter, not a wife, and he was easily four times her age, or five. She did not want him; some part of her, perhaps, loved him, but as one loves an uncle, a father, a grandfather. Not a husband, not a lover.

But Anthony's existence proved she wasn't crazy for this, since his existence proved all her hopes rang true. When her thoughts turned to him, his pale, sun-bleached hair, his smooth, unblemished skin, his blue eyes, his hands in hers, she wanted to melt, and although she could not ever think of what to say, the songs would come to her lips again, although these were happier songs: no longer did she long to be free and on her own, she longed now for Anthony, a future she knew was no idle fantasy, but a reality, a true future. Why, just in a few days, they'd be hand in hand, saying their wedding vows. And then – and then –

But the days passed, with no sign of him. Sunday went by, and Monday and days and days until the dates were lost among the sounds of the crazed women she shared a room with. At first she had merely stood at her window, and called to the night air, and watched in vain for her Anthony to come traipsing down the street with a brilliant plan for her escape – but then she began to fear, and as the weeks passed, she let herself stop hoping a little bit. Well, maybe he didn't know where she was; maybe he didn't have the means to rescue her.

Maybe he'd never come. Maybe he didn't care.

But he would, he did – he _had_ to: the thought of it was all that kept her going. It was the blood that pulsed through her veins, and it was all the life that she had left. _Days_, she told herself – _that's all he needs, days or weeks. Not even months. He'll come, and soon._

As the weeks went by, she waned, grew wan, paler; although she could not see her own face, she saw it in her hands, her forearms; now, the only thing that seemed to be growing was her hair. Was this life of unfulfilled hopes and malnutrition and lunatics worth it? Would it be better to marry Turpin?

_No_, she told herself, and held fast: this _is better, because my Anthony will come_.

Although her mind was swimming with doubts, she stuck to it, because something, anything, was better than giving in and letting the world do with her what it would.


	4. The Assistant

All his life he had asked no questions, and when he had been talked to, everything he heard was lies. Because of that, all the statements he ever said were lies, lies, lies, but to call them out, to watch all of the townspeople scurry to him and eat up everything he said, that was the best part of his life. Because, God knew, the hours after it were the worst. Pirelli was not a friend. To work until his fingers bled, till his eyes felt as if they were going to fall out, that wasn't quite hell: coming home only to get beaten and screamed at, that was hell. Apparently his lies, his sweet, lovely lies, they weren't enough. What else could he give, though? He asked no questions, but he still wondered.

Sometimes, when he could think of nothing else to do, he sat still, as still as he could, and thought: and the thoughts that flowed through his minds seemed not to be his. They seemed much more intelligent than he ever thought he could be. He wondered why events could be both bad and good at the same time, while people, people, seemed to be either good or bad; why was it that people, who made events happen anyways, were so uncomplicated, while the things that they did seemed to flow out in every direction, changing everything, good and bad all at once?

So it was the day that Pirelli left him, the day he met Mrs. Lovett.

Bad things at first: Pirelli lost some sort of contest, and he was mad. More mad than Toby had ever seen him. Pounding mad, fists-kicks-screams mad, although when he was in front of a crowd he acted like such a gentleman. It was as if the moment he was out of the public's eyes, he was possessed by demons, and Toby was afraid.

Later that day, they went over to the barber's shop, the one who'd defeated Pirelli. Toby wondered what he was doing there, but didn't dare open his mouth: with the state his master was in, it wouldn't be wise, wouldn't be smart to ask questions. So he held them in and watched. That evening, when he realized with a deep sinking sensation that Pirelli really wasn't coming back, it was the worst day of his life, or so he thought; but the lovely Mrs. Lovett held him in her arms and pet him like he was her own and crooned to him and for the first time in his life, he was happy.

He was content to follow her after that, and although he hadn't even followed around Pirelli so faithfully, almost like a puppy, he was not ashamed; this was, of course, not his old Master, it was a new one, a new, kinder one, who made disgusting – but filling – meat pies and let him drink like he was an adult and didn't make him wear silly wigs or tell lies. In fact, he hardly ever lied anymore, and he made a promise to himself, a promise he never broke, that he would never, ever lie to Mrs. Lovett. She deserved more than lies, more than Pirelli deserved. People were either all good or all bad, he had learned in his short life: Mrs. Lovett was good, all good, and Pirelli was all bad.

Mr. Todd, though, he didn't understand. The man was quiet and stony and mean, but he didn't hurt Toby, and though Toby didn't know a thing about him, he trusted him, trusted him wholly, because Mrs. Lovett was a friend, the best friend he'd ever had.

But then the feelings began to eat at him. Premonitions, one could call him, or guesses; and he could hardly stand to look at the man without the thoughts flooding back into his head. Toby knew he was not that intelligent, but neither was he stupid, and he knew, he knew. He tried to tell Mrs. Lovett. She wouldn't listen.

How was it that people listened to all he said when all he said was lies, but the moment he began to speak the truth, people stopped listening to him?


	5. The Framed Man

And how in the world was he supposed to react? He had something—no, that was wrong; he had _everything_—and they had snatched it away, taken it from his hands as greedily as if it was food and they were starving. They had left him cold and, worse, alone, alone with men whose crimes actually had been committed.

Those men weren't like him, not then. Perhaps in their way, they shaped him, shaped him to be a more callous person—but he didn't know, he couldn't see himself, couldn't see how he changed, or rather how he was changed. All he knew was that he would rather die than spend his life in that hellhole: and so he left.

He nearly did die, but somehow—if he believed this, he would have said it was Providence, but as it was, those fifteen dank years had stripped him of his faith—he did not.

The town he returned to was his home. It was a barren, cold place, and there were too many memories, but still, it was home, and it was bittersweet—those first few moments of smelling the smoky, blunt smell of the city's air, the ground heaving from the swaying of the ship being suddenly taken away, and the boy beside him, it was all, somehow, like being home again. Even if Lucy was not there, even if the air was dirtier than he remembered it to be, even if no one seemed to remember his face—he was home.

And, for a while, things got better from there—in those glittering things he called his friends; they warmed to his flesh and somehow, although he knew that they were nothing more than metal warmed with the heat of the blood beneath his skin, they seemed alive—like companions.

How did they expect him to react? Did they think that the poor victim of Benjamin Barker would perhaps find the penal colonies to be suited to him, and be content to live his miserable life in a hot and dry foreign land? Did they think that that pitiful man would be fine watching all be taken away? Did they think he would just lie down and take it?

Well, whatever they thought, they were wrong.

Dead wrong.

He would not take it, even if perhaps that Barker fellow would have, because God and Mrs. Lovett and whatever scrap of soul he had left all knew that he was not that goddamned Benjamin Barker any longer. He was someone else, a different man, a man with whom Benjamin Barker perhaps shared some physical similarities, but a man that would not lie down and let the world roll over him.

What did they think he'd do? Curl up in prison and sob his eyes out? Maybe Barker had done that—Todd didn't remember. Maybe doing nothing, he thought once, would be the smartest thing to do. But that thought flitted out of his mind as soon as it'd came, and was gone much too soon for Todd to start questioning whether he was doing what he should. Losing all was hard, impossibly hard, but not gaining it back, letting it all slip through his fingers again, would be so many times harder, and that, if nothing else, would kill him.

And still, though he was by no means young, he wasn't old. He had time, more than enough time, and he couldn't think of a better way to spend it. So he would simply do nothing—for a while. It was not really doing nothing: he was planning and waiting and watching and speaking with his friends.

He had all the time in the world, and what better way to spend it than revenge?


	6. The Landlady

**Mrs. Lovett, Part One**

Mrs. Lovett knew that men like him were rare—men with the stars in their eyes, men whose every action glowed, who did nothing without a healthy dose of passion. And yet, living and talking with him, watching him, it was obvious that he was no god—it was as if every slip-up, every stutter, every mistake only endeared him to her more. He was human through and through, but the sort of human who glittered when he walked, who moved with a grace that one couldn't learn.

The problem, she knew, was not this. The problem was that he had been able to find someone like him—someone nearly worthy of him—someone just as perfect as he was.

Lucy was lovely, pale, and pure; she was demure, and did not flirt so much as make all men fall instantly in love with her.

And Barker, being, of course, mortal, and not a god, was therefore quite susceptible to her spell.

Although she was young in these days, Mrs. Lovett knew love when she saw it: and this, this was no passing fancy; nor was it lust. They were made for each other, people said; their wedding was heavenly, and no one had ever seen a couple more in love.

Then their world ended.

Of course, of course, it was not Barker's fault; when she thought about it, Mrs. Lovett realized that in reality it was none of their faults, but still she felt the pang of anger each time she saw Lucy's face, still beautiful though slick with tears. _So what_, she wanted to cry, _if your husband is gone?_

_At least he was your husband!_

_At least_ _you_ _can cry openly!_

_At least he loved you!_

She wanted at each turn either to slap Lucy, to spit out some harsh, venom-worded rebuke, or to simply ignore the woman, and so she just treated her coldly, an act that took great restraint on Mrs. Lovett's part. The little whore probably didn't even notice; everyone was hugging her, giving her flowers, telling them how sad they were that her husband had done whatever blasted crime he had done to be shipped off. She was an angel, they all said, for enduring this.

_This,_ _this,_ Mrs. Lovett wanted to scream, _is nothing. Look at_ me!

But she was silent.

And, of course, they came for the girl, as Mrs. Lovett knew they would; indeed, those same people who had been consoling her for Benjamin's disappearance were waiting, and watching. It did not take long at all for the vultures to come—the dirty, disgusting men, the ones that Lucy had been too perfect to be mean to. The unwanted suitors—and, in some corner of her mind, Mrs. Lovett wondered precisely what separated her from these people, the judge and his crony, his beadle.

The girl, in all her high, otherworldly thoughts, could think nothing but the best of them, and so she fell—gracefully, as always, if a little thoughtlessly—into their trap.

Mrs. Lovett cannot say precisely what happened that night, or why so many people knew and did nothing to stop the torture of the woman they said they loved. It was a party, and they were all there, decked out in their beautiful fashions, the high-society sociopaths, a place where the lady could finally fit in—a ball that could have been hers, if only she'd married the judge.

As it was, it was her hell. Mrs. Lovett surprised herself by feeling guilt threading through her veins, even before the lady came back from that party; she comforted herself by insisting in her mind that this pain that Lucy was feeling, it was nothing compared to her own heartache.

It didn't work.

When the girl came home, her face again stained and sticky with her own tears, her whole body shaking, wracked by sobs, Mrs. Lovett comforted her, gave her some ale, held her in her arms and let her sob. It wasn't fair; none of life was.

The next morning, the girl's tears were gone, and her expression held a certain stoniness that chilled Mrs. Lovett to the bone: it was as if all of the emotion had been sucked out of her, as if she had been forced to feel too much grief, and so had decided it was safer and much less painful to feel absolutely nothing at all. There was a one-word answer floating on her lips: poison.

The only way, she said: the only way to handle this, the only way to react. The only thing that could work.

And Mrs. Lovett let her go.

If the girl decided to end her own life, well, it was her own grief that made her do it; it was not malice but compassion that held Mrs. Lovett back as the door slammed in her face and the image of a pale-haired girl faded before her eyes; it was terror that kept her sitting in her chair, shaking with fright, wondering if Lucy would return home to die in her own home or if they'd find a body in the street in a week or two.

But she was not ready for what came for her.

Up the stairs came music—singing—the sweetest singing voice that Mrs. Lovett had ever heard. This was Lucy, had to be, and yet the song on her lips was not a personal requiem, but a quick dance, and the lyrics seemed to be the word "beadle" over and over and over. There was a certain fast cheeriness in the song that sent chills up and down her back, and she rose.

Mrs. Lovett moved to open the door, but the knob turned on its own accord and an unseen hand yanked the door open. The woman stared blankly into the visitor's face, unheeding for a moment; she opened her mouth to say something, anything, but all the words had fled.

It was not Lucy that stood there—it couldn't be—it was a monster, her eyes wide, her lips torn and bleeding. Mrs. Lovett realized that this was from her own teeth, and that the scratches on the backs of her hands had to be from the same thing.

The thing that once was Lucy stopped her song in mid-note and opened her lips into a smile, a little blood running down her skin and dripping off her jawline; there on her face were the same features, Mrs. Lovett saw, that were once so prettily done up with makeup and so lovingly caressed by Benjamin, but now were dripping with grime.

The creature, the thing, the girl, laughed, and, tossing her hair wildly over her shoulder, began to sing again. Then, her fingers, slick with her own blood, scrabbled on the doorknob; when she found her grip, she threw it shut, leaving Mrs. Lovett alone in the darkness. The still air resounded with the shrill singing, the same voice that had once belonged to an angel.

The woman sat heavily back down on her stool, her hands gripping each other tightly. This—this—this was payback for a crime never committed—this was unfair—a travesty. God or the Devil or whatever the hell was out there had turned a pretty little girl into a victim, and, after that, a monster. And all for a sin—suicide—that she hadn't even had a chance to commit.

_If this was how God treats the angelic, the beautiful,_ Mrs. Lovett wondered, _what the hell will happen to me?_

**((Note: Thank you to everyone who reviewed and offered suggestions--I greatly appreciate it. I meant for this chapter to cover more, but when it didn't, and didn't even go that deep into Mrs. Lovett's psyche, I decided there will be two parts--one with Benjamin, and one with Todd. The second part will probably come next, and then, in random order, I have the Beadle, Pirelli, and of course Lucy, who I am saving for last. I might have two parts for her too.))**


	7. The Keeper

**((Augh, sorry for not updating for so long. I apologize if this is a bit confusing. It is Fogg, the owner of the lunatic asylum. I've always thought that he was a bit looney himself...))**

They spoke with him and pronounced him different.

He didn't know where the line was; after all, everyone was different. But this was a bizarre branding: he had not known, his whole life, how others acted, and so he couldn't compare himself to those people. How was he to know what he was and what he couldn't be?

No matter, they all told him: it will pass. You will be normal.

He felt that somehow that day never did come to pass—he simply learned to hide it better. He watched people now, watched how they walked and spoke and dressed and danced. He mimicked them, so that he would seem, to the average person, if not a normal man, then a pretty damn good imitation of one. He even, for the first time in his life, began to get friends, and, for some time, the trouble melted.

Then he found out that there were more. More, more people such as him: people whose worlds were a little sideways-skewed, whose expressions did not always match their faces, whose words escaped them – people who had heads in which sane thoughts simply would not form. And so soon after he had remedied himself – it was something of a shock to him, to find that this so-called infirmity that had polluted his head was not a little corruption in his brain, it was in others' brains, too. It was scary, how he began to wonder: and to wonder was to question, and so he began to seek answers.

He talked to them and the first question on his lips was, Was I really like that?

He knew he wasn't, couldn't have been. These were the folks that had to have special places built for them – the people who had untold strength and no morality, or no intelligence, or no way to piece their thoughts together. Lunatics, everyone called them. 

Fogg did not call them lunatics.

He called them his flock.

He knew that somehow, here, he'd found his calling: somewhere beyond the normal, beyond the happy-faced friends he'd so recently met and the troubled world of his childhood, there were these people, these odd, half-formed people – the ones they called lunatics – and the people on the outside resolved to lock them away.

He hated them all, and loved them too. They were all too much like him. They had minds like children, some of them; others had the minds of philosophers, others those of demons. He could not let himself fear them, though they itched to have power and wanted to be feared. He wanted to control them. Somehow, he knew, or thought he knew, that by controlling these freaks he could control the part of himself that made him like them.

He was better than them. He did not have to be locked up in an asylum, anyhow. Perhaps he would have been, if he hadn't had such skills at imitating others. Why, he had put on such a brave face, brave enough to convince all who had questions, and so there was nothing to fear from him. True, the darkness still thrilled him sometimes, chilling his brain as it seeped into his thoughts, but he pushed it down, he pushed it down. Plus, he had those who loved him, even if he did not always love him back. They were good for him; they'd not locked him up, as these other loveless fools' families had. He was safe on his own, if he had someone looking over his shoulder.

But that shepherd would not always be there for him, those parents, that sibling, so he had to learn to watch out for himself now.

Besides: he was now the shepherd of others. He had lunatics to protect, to protect them from themselves.


	8. The Showman

He was simply born into a world not beautiful enough for him. It was a matter of opinion, of course, but the world he perceived was a grayer, stormier one than the one his heart wished to inhabit. Dirt was his foe, grayscale his sworn enemy: so he went on to make a life of turning darkness into light, ugliness into beauty, and truth into lies.

He himself was born sadly human and with all the burdens and flaws that humans had to bear, but from the first pangs of self-realization he felt as a child he strived to make himself more presentable to the world. He would rather go out naked than wearing conservative clothing; if the world could not judge you on your outside, then what could they judge you on? Simply from making sure that his face was always soft and free of unwanted stubble, he became adept at handling a razor and decided that being a barber was as good a career as any to improve the dressings the world wore. It was easier than sewing clothing, he knew, or painting, and it wasn't an unrespectable profession; he would not be looked down in others' eyes.

But the cold, twisted realities of the world crept up on him, little by little, to show their faces. One could not become a barber without training; one could not get training easily. It was with much effort that he secured a place in a small, dinky barber's shop, a million miles from the well-lit and nicely-kept room he'd imagined in his head. Well, it was a start, he told himself, but the pessimist in him attacked. If he was betraying his own values and working for a slob, someone who did not share the same mission as he, then he wasn't doing good or right.

But the razors – the razors changed that. They were pure power, with blades sharp enough to tear through skin and muscle but gentle enough so that, in the right hands, they could brush flesh and leave no mark, cause no pain. The play of light and dark across their blades was nothing but art in itself, and though he knew he was not good enough yet to wield those things properly, he lusted. There was no word for it besides that. When Barker held them in his hands and pressed them against a customer's cheek, he felt a thrill; he longed to hold them one day in his own hands, to use that sort of power to make the world lovely and well-shaven.

It did not come to pass. Barker went to jail and now the boy was on the streets. Years passed, years that flew despite the drudgery of it all, and though his dreams of owning those razors slipped away, he never forgot what he strove for. Another cold reality hit him, that without money, ugly though it could be, he could not make himself presentable, and so because he would rather die than beg, he began to steal.

Oh, it was not really stealing: or rather it was stealing from the foolish, something he could almost agree with. With each day he slipped and fell, and slipped a little more; the world looked darker to him, and so his attempts to lighten it became something of a disease, a fevered passion. This was what he was striving for; could he bear the feeling of leaving this world knowing that he had changed it not at all? Could he stand himself? Could he stand this gray, dreary place in which he found himself for much longer?

And fast on his descent down, down, ever down, something caught his eye.

Old friends, almost. Not the man – the razors. Not that bedraggled, dark-eyed barber who wielded them with daring and bet so much upon his skill: it was not this wraith he recognized. And if those weapons had been held by different hands, hands that did not treat them as lovingly as their former master Barker had, then they would never have been recognized.

Here was an opportunity.

Pirelli leapt.


End file.
